This is a pretty fair representation of what I felt like two weeks ago. My weight stalled and even though I could see a difference in my shape, this is what I felt like. It was just a continuation of the week before where I just sorta felt all blah and not really into anything. Allergies have seriously been taking a toll on me. I felt squished and stretched out all at the same time. I didn’t know if I was coming or going with this weight loss thing. I was doing (mostly) all the right things and I was stuck. I was doing my best not to get defeated and thanks to some friends from the twitter Medifast group and my nutritionist (what up, Jennifer!), once again I’ve persevered.

Last Monday (5/2) I decided I was pissed off at my body and I was going to show it who’s running the show around here. I started from square one. Medifast only, all the time. No soda, no condiments, no extras. I was slowly letting myself fall back into some bad habits. I had convinced myself that I had come so far in such a short time, what’s a little extra ketchup on my southwest eggs? or I’m feeling lazy, I don’t really need to weigh those veggies. Well, I’ll tell you what a little extra ketchup is: it’s a progress sucker. So last Monday I got back to basics. I put away the condiments, I put away the soda (even though they were diet). I weighed everything. I eased up on the exercise a bit (I can’t say for sure but I may have been over doing it). And I drank more water than I thought was humanly possible.

You know what I got?

I got more awesome. (I know, I didn’t think it was possible either!)

I lost 3 more pounds

Ketchup, I love ya. But you and me? We are breaking up. Maybe we’ll see each other in the store once in a while and we’ll say hi and look at one another wistfully. We’ll recall the good times; the cheese fries, the hot dogs, that awesome char-burger where I paired you with a sinful amount of mayo. But you and I both know that we are not good for each other. We are a couple of enablers. The love affair has run it’s course. I’ll miss you but I’ve got to set you free.

What else have I been up to? I am more productive than ever. Walking during my lunch break. Taking my daughter for bike rides. Getting things done around the house. Though you wouldn’t know from the looks of it – doing some Spring cleaning (we’ll talk about space saver bags later but omg, love them!). I’ve recaptured that burst of energy that I had in the first month of Medifast. Now that I remember what it’s like, I DO NOT want to lose this again.

So where did I go wrong? How did I fall off the tracks (sort of)? Is it because the diet is hard to stick to?

Nope, not at all.

It all came down to personal choices. While I may not have acknowledged it in the moment, looking back I knew those tastes, bites and licks would catch up to me. I knew, because of my past issues with overeating that I could easily fall back into bad habits. This is something I will have to work on my entire life. Medifast can help me build the confidence to work through it but only I can resolve this issue within myself. But I had fooled myself into thinking that I was ok. Look at me! I resisted Easter candy! No Cadbury eggs have passed through these lips! But the extras weaseled their way in literally right under my nose.

If anything though, I think this is further proof that this plan works if you work it. Since getting back on track, I am down 3lbs in a week and I feel fantastic again. And aside from indulging in a bread stick and a few sips of a cocktail at the Olive Garden when my father took us out for Mother’s Day, I was even able to stay on plan when eating out. I planned for that meal and made good choices in preparation of those extra calories. I knew that I would feel better about things and see better results by arming myself with the resolve to make better choices. Its true in all aspects of life that the little things are what make a big difference. Success on this plan is important to me on so many levels. It’s too easy to fail.

It is always difficult to choose between what is right and what is easy. I’ve been all over the map. But I know which path I’m taking from now on. Do you?

If you’re interested in trying Medifast, I have a great deal for you! Use the code TURNIP50 to get $50 off an order of $275.

*FTC Disclosure: Medifast provides their products for my personal use for free. I am not paid or compensated in any other way for mentioning their products. All thoughts written here are mine. I love complaining so I would tell you if I didn’t like something in the program.

Hope you have a great time, Heather! Please email me at mommabrown08@gmail.com so that I can send your passes to you.

Thank you to all that entered. I’ve never done a giveaway before and even though the entries were low, I’d like to think it was a success. Thanks for your support and hopefully we can try this again in the future!

Disclaimer: The Please Touch Museum did not provide these passes and are not sponsors of this giveaway. These passes were purchased via Living Social. Unfortunately they will expire before I have the opportunity to use them. Once a winner is chosen, the voucher will be transferred to the winner. Got it?

Have you been to the Please Touch Museum in Fairmount Park yet? This is one of my favorite destinations in Philadelphia. Honestly, I don’t know who enjoys it more, Izzy or me!

If you’ve never been, this is your chance to check it out for free! I’ve got these passes that expire on May 27th and I can’t get there between now and then. How fortunate for you that I like to share and hate it when good things go to waste!

There is so much to do there it’s tough to get it all done in one day. But somehow a toddler demands that it all be seen, touched and heard.

So do you want to go or what?!? We always have so much fun when we go. These photos don’t even show half of the experience you’ll have at PTM. Have your camera battery charged. You will want to capture all the smiles and squeals of delight from your kids!

What do you get?

You will receive 4 admission passes to the museum, 4 tickets to ride the carousel and my well wishes that you have an awesome time!

What do I want?

Well, I need some lovin’. Twitter lovin’, Facebook lovin’, blog lovin’. You name it, I need it! Hell, Please Touch me too! Ok…wait. No. That would be inappropriate. But I’ll need you to do all the other stuff.

What do you need to do?

Choose one or all of the options below. Then come back here and tell me what you did. I would suggest that you put each entry in a separate comment to increase your chances of winning.

– Like me on Facebook (I know you really want to love me. But that’s not an option)

– Vote for my blog on Circle of Moms (you can vote once a day. That means you can put a new entry into this contest every day!)

– Follow my blog through Google Connect (over there in the sidebar)

If you already follow me, those count as entries as well.

Contest ends at midnight, May 8th. The winner will be chosen and announced Monday, May 9th. The winner will have 24hours to contact me and will receive the voucher via email. If that person does not respond, then another drawing will be held.

Good Luck and have fun! Share some of your pics on my wall in Facebook. I can’t wait to hear about what a great time you had!

Disclaimer: The Please Touch Museum did not provide these passes and are not sponsors of this giveaway. These passes were purchased via Living Social. Unfortunately they will expire before I have the opportunity to use them. Once a winner is chosen, the voucher will be transferred to the winner. Got it?

Lets start with an open letter to a celebrity. Or if you don’t want to read about me bitching at Kirstie Alley scroll to the middle to skip to the regularly scheduled portion of my Take it Off post.

—-

Dear Kirstie Alley,

Girlfriend, we all have eyes and we can see you. If you are a size 8, then I am a 00 and we all know that is not true.

Now, Kirstie, I like you a lot. I think you are smart, witty, self depricating and you are truly a stunning woman. You are wickedly funny and your hair is nothing short of a gift from heaven above. Look Who’s Talking will always be one of my favorite guilty pleasures. And the movie you did with the dude from Night Court, I like that one too.You’ve got a lot to be proud of.

But you, my friend, are no size 8. The fact that you claim you are makes me upset with you. I mean, you can admit that you were a raging coke-head back in your Cheer’s days. (And I think we all know the dirty little things that raging coke-heads do when they are snorting their faces off.) But you can’t admit that you wear clothing that scores in the double digits?

What really bothers me is that all the chunky girls that look at you and say ‘See? Fat can be pretty too!’ you basically told them they are disgusting. Because you aren’t saying you are a size 12 when you *might* be a 16. You are saying ‘I think people our size are so disgusting that I’ve deluded myself into believing that people will think I am really am a size 8 if I just say it and stick with the lie.’ Now if I just cut all the tags out of my size 20’s no one will ever be the wiser! *snipsnipsnip*

Unfortunately for you Kirstie, everyone that is watching Dancing with the Stars has EYES. It’s ok that you don’t like your size but don’t insult our intelligence.

In my mind you making a ludicrous statement like “I’m a size 8” puts you on the same level with fatty hater Maura Kelly. Remember her and how much we thought she sucked when she said fat people made her sick?

Kirstie, don’t get me wrong. I get it. When you don’t feel good about yourself, you tell yourself little lies to feel better. But you are doing yourself a disservice by trying to sell people this nonsense. You make yourself look the fool and you disappoint people like me that think you are actually embracing your body and your size and in turn embrace theirs. I mean it has to be true if you dare to go on national TV knowing that you will be the butt of fat jokes…but I guess not. I know you weren’t comfortable when you did the Oprah/bikini stunt – but it was so bad ass that you did it anyway. DWTS and Oprah? Two checks in the bad-ass column.

So Kirstie, when you want to start being bad ass again, please come clean about your size. I want to love you, I really, really do. But let’s get real. You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of – well, nothing except the blatant lies and assuming that everyone is stupid.

Love, Kelly

(who is a size 18 and 219ish lbs and will probably always wear double digits.)

Now, on to me. I’ll just put it right out there. I didn’t lose a single pound this week. I didn’t even get a .anything. I am exactly at the same weight I reported last week. This is the part where I kick myself for not breaking out the measuring tape every week. Because even though that scale hasn’t budged all week, I can definitely feel that I’ve lost inches. I guess that is how is goes sometimes. I won’t kid you, it’s frustrating because I like to see that number move. But we’ll have weeks like this and it’s ok. Hopefully next week I will have a loss to report and I am going to start taking measurements.

I did up my exercise routine this past week. I’m now riding my bike at least three times a week. On that bike ride I am pulling a trailer and almost 40lbs of toddler behind me, uphill for at least 3 miles. My nutritionist said that could be the culprit and that I might see better results next week.

She also told me that I could blame gravity.

So I will. Gravity and exercise are the cause of my lack of loss. There. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it!

On Saturday night I was a little bored. I was down in the basement collecting things for Good Will and came upon the trash bag that my wedding dress is in (yes, the trash bag). Just for funsies I decided to drag it upstairs and try it on. I knew it wouldn’t fit but I thought it would be fun to start using it for before and after pics. Maybe I will try it on every ten pounds or so.

You wanna see?

That’s no baby bump! (do you love the window graffiti?)

I think its fair to say that without scaffolding and clamps or breaking any ribs, I got it zipped up about halfway.

JC Penney pretty!

So there you have it folks. No loss this week and I still can’t wear my wedding dress. But that toothpaste did help my pimples.

If you’re interested in trying Medifast, I have a great deal for you! Use the code TURNIP50 to get $50 off an order of $275.

*FTC Disclosure: Medifast provides their products for my personal use for free. I am not paid or compensated in any other way for mentioning their products. All thoughts written here are mine. I love complaining so I would tell you if I didn’t like something in the program.